


That I Should Rise (and you should not)

by abrawmclaren



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Ghost Anakin Skywalker, Jedi Leia Organa, Multi, Post-Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Sith Training, Tatooine (Star Wars)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-02
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:21:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22089313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abrawmclaren/pseuds/abrawmclaren
Summary: Half of her mind is a rushing wind whistling over a barren field; the half where he once lived in her.On Tatooine, a second chance presents itself - from a certain point of view.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey & Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Rey/Anakin Skywalker
Comments: 10
Kudos: 58





	1. How Many More Ghosts

**Author's Note:**

> Maaaaajoorrrr spoilers for TRoS, but I needed to write this.
> 
> ALSO HI THIS IS AU AS USUAL.

"Skywalker, you say?" The old woman shifts her cowl, squinting at Rey in the failing desert suns. "You have the look of the female get to you, anyway. That queen - what was her name? Amidala. Had pretty brown hair, she did. Like you."

The tears come unbidden. They have since Exegol, but the old woman stands too far away to see. She schools one final, quizzical glance at Rey and turns to leave.

Rey finds her voice. "Do you know where I might find parts for the vaporator?"

"Tosche Station" the old woman calls over her shoulder. "Welcome home."

She sleeps with her quarterstaff in the small bedchamber in the personal quarters below the farm.

Rey does not dream.

  


****

* * *

****

  


Her sojourn to Tosche Station yielded the necessary parts, but she had been slaving away for the last two hours scrubbing the paneling of the vaporator just to be able to open its as-yet corroded maintenance accesses. Rey wipes sweat from her brow, her mouth grainy and dry.

"You need to suffuse the anti-corrosion paste over it first and let it dry overnight. That'll soak up the excess sand, and you can peel it off like the rind of a Corellian blood orange. The access panels will pop right open after that."

Rey jumps no less than one foot off the ground. "Who in the _fuck_ are you?"

"Coarse language is unnecessary."

He towers over her - Rey thinks he's cleared almost two meters, although he looms even larger standing over her. Long sandy hair flecked with gray, much like Master Luke's, sweeps over his brow in a fringe which moves ethereally with the desert wind. He's wearing nondescript clothing; a thin cobalt blue tunic and black pants tucked into matte black boots. A glove covers his right hand, but she can see the sheen of metal where a part of his arm is exposed just above the elbow. His eyes are deep, dark, and intense - but friendly. Rey doubles back, surprised at her own uncouth language.

"You don't - you don't just sneak up on someone like that." Her silent interloper chuckles good-naturedly. He's tan, strangely familiar lips and pain behind his eyes lies - well. Maz was always going on about peoples' eyes, and Rey knows why she's doing this.

 _Ben._ Her chest surges.

"My apologies." His voice is even, not at all biting or chiding. Rey senses nothing but sound intentions from him, but remains wary. The man squats beside her, taking the anti-corrosion paste from the pile of tools and supplies at Rey's feet. He squeezes some into his large, calloused hands - Rey gets the impression that he's done this before - and shows her how to layer the paste. "This was designed for harsh climates where routine maintenance might prove difficult. Here, you've got sandstorms at night, but the wind that blows through here will allow it to dry quickly." He takes fist fulls of sand as he rises to a remarkable height, and the paste peels off and he tosses the balls of paste-sand onto the ground. "Easy enough if you know what you're doing."

"You certainly seem as though you do."

"Moisture farming is an art. This farm's yields were once the best on Tatooine."

Rey slowly rises. "I grew up on Jakku. We had smaller, portable units. This is way different."

"It's all about the quality of your equipment, but also your recipes" the man says "though I'm sure this place was gutted of whatever remained after the previous tenants' demise. You have your work cut out for you."

"Thanks" she offers smoothly, finding the strength of her own voice again. "I didn't think many people came out here. That's why you - you surprised me."

"They don't" he offers softly. "But it's good to see that someone else will love this farm. Make it what it once was."

She rises to her feet, and he joins her after looking around, crouched low in the sand, his organic hand taking a fistful of it and watching as it flew away on the wind between his fingers. He seems familiar with the surroundings, as though perhaps, like the old woman, he came out here to ensure that Tuskens or other nefarious beings wouldn't do harm to the standing memorial of Luke's family. Rey senses nothing from him, although when she reaches out through the Force she detects mental shielding almost immediately. If this man _is_ Sensitive, she will need to be wary.

"I erm, I suppose I should offer you some refreshment. In gratitude" she finishes hastily. Since her life on Jakku, hospitality was among the newer skills she had learned - and friends in the desert were hard to come by.

They make their way down to the kitchen area, Rey's weariness growing as the as-yet unnamed friendly face looks around him as though he is uncovering a great archaeological find. She busies herself with pouring two large glasses of sweetwater she had purchased at Anchorhead, pulling out some flatbread and an olive chutney. Rey had barely managed to make the living quarters serviceable, and she hadn't thought to have guests so soon (Fin and Poe, as acting generals, still had quite a bit to do before they could rendezvous with her in one standard week), but she finds that she's happy enough for the company.

"I'm Rey" she offers her hand, jutting it outward, she thinks, with a bit too much enthusiasm after setting their food and water on the table. The tall stranger smiles, taking it in one of his own large, surprisingly smooth hands.

"A pleasure, Rey. What brings you to Tatooine?"

They sit, and Rey explains with measured caution. "I was in the Resistance. After the destruction of the Sith fleet, I came here to - rebuild, I suppose. I'd heard that - well, I heard that no one had tended the farm for years and I'm used to crusty deserts." The man laughs, drinking long and deep from his cup. He drains it, and Rey gladly refills it.

"What about you?"

"I suppose I came from Coruscant. You know, this place - it hasn't changed at all. Untouched."

Rey studies him, gently reaching out with the Force a second time to find that his shields aren't as formidable. She is greeted with a sharp pang, a vision of molten, white hot terror. It's but a flash, but it's enough. Rey focuses on her breathing, listens to Master Luke's voice, steady and sure

_No one's ever really gone_

Rey supposes that it was bound to happen; it had been confirmed that Palpatine had kept hundreds of clones as a contingency for his own demise, and it wouldn't be much of a logical leap to conclude that the Skywalker patriarch had done the same. But the dark side is elusive and slippery, a tear in the Force, and that could be all this man was; simply the Force rent in two, reacting to Rey's own shaky conceptualization of her dark heritage, goading her further into accepting the darkness for herself. She imagined it would always be this way. She would always be haunted - by Ben's kiss, by Palpatine, by losing Masters Luke and Leia. Reclaiming the moisture farm wouldn't be enough, and this man seemed to know these things.

"You said you came from Coruscant. Why settle on Tatooine?"

The man regards her coolly. They sit for a long time, staring at each other.

"Anakin?" Rey finally says on a sigh.

The tall man nods, adjusting his glove. "Got any lubricant? This thing freezes up constantly out here."

_Anakin Skywalker is back from the dead and just asked me for lube. You've got to be fucking kidding me._

"You're certainly mouthy enough to be a Skywalker."

"The lubricant is in the shop, but you know where that is. Read my mind again, and I swear on all the hells I'll brain you with my quarterstaff."

Anakin grunts, getting up and stalking off to the shop. "You didn't waste much time. Expecting visitors?"

"That's -" Rey shakes her head. This has to be a dream; a machination of exhaustion, of grief. "That's none of your business!"

The man - ghost, visitant, whatever - swipes the lubricant from the shelf, jerking the sleeve of his tunic up to reveal the offending cybernetics. "I know what you're thinking. I'm sorry. I just couldn't bear the thought of someone being in this place again without knowing what it means."

"Luke and Leia - your children - taught me everything I need to know. Everything about _you_."

"Did they indeed?" He finishes his work, replacing the bottle back where it had been on the shelf. He keeps his sleeve rolled up, and rolls up the other to match it. "I will return tomorrow to help you remove the anti-corrosion paste. Try not to damage the unit with your tinkering in the meantime."

"Get out." Rey says icily. "I don't need your help."

Anakin's face freezes into a scowl, but there's no menace behind it - which only serves to confuse Rey further.

"I said the same to my master at one time, and look what happened."

This stuns Rey into silence, and all she can do is watch him ascend the steps up into the desert. She lets him leave, too shocked and disturbed to say more, although she finds her legs again and launches herself after him only to vault the last three steps before the landing and the vast desert to find no sign of the man she had entertained.

She needed to comm Poe.


	2. Dark Lineages

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey reports her strange run-in with a man who looks like Anakin Skywalker to General Poe Dameron, who simply chalks it up to Rey's grief over Ben.
> 
> As promised, the-man-who-looks-like-Anakin returns the next day and offers insight only the long-dead Skywalker would know.

"It's insane. I know." Rey tries to swallow the big ball of grief in her throat and fails fantastically. "I know it's probably because of what happened with Ben. I know intellectually that I'm grieving, and it's so hot and disgusting and _sandy_ out here, and this godsdamned vaporator isn't working and this was probably all a terrible, stupid idea born of romanticism of the past and I never should have come."

Poe smiles, though it's more of a gesture of sympathy and comfort than anything else. "You're doing something the rest of us don't and couldn't understand. It's probably normal to feel isolated right now; and maybe that isolation is making you - y'know, see things." His visage even in the blue hue of a holotable looked exhausted. Rey suddenly aches for her friends, for the comfort and familiarity of Chewie, Fin, Rose, and Poe.

"He was _there_ , Poe. I touched him. He was a flesh-and-blood person. I saw - I saw and felt what happened to him on Mustafar. When he fell. Why would he come back right now? Aren't you at all concerned about _Darth Vader_ suddenly making a reappearance on the coattails of Palpatine?"

Silence on the other end. Rey cards a shaking hand through her (annoying sandy) hair. She'd need to hit the 'fresher after this, assuming she could get it to work.

"Hello?!"

"Rey, did you - you know, do any weird Jedi stuff when you got there?"

"I buried Master Leia's lightsaber. Anakin's too."

"That's not weird."

"Are you suggesting that I brought Anakin Skywalker back from the dead?"

"No - look, Rey, things are a little hectic. I'd come out sooner, but the guy sounds harmless. He's probably just a lookalike who lives on the edge of the dunes and wants some company. Stay on your guard. We'll be there as soon as the first session of the New Senate ends, okay?"

Rey scoffs.

"Hey. I know. I don't want to minimize what you must be going through after losing Ben, and I'm not pressuring you to talk about it - with me or anyone else."

"Thank you" the newly-minted Jedi offers weakly. "I don't know what to make of all of this. It happened suddenly and feels so familiar. I can't describe it, and I don't think we should overlook the possibility that Anakin Skywalker is among the living. If Palpatine did it, so could he."

"Try to get some sleep. I'll comm you after the Senate meets in the morning. If all goes well, the credits we'll need to start the base on Chandrila will be authorized and Finn will go to get you. I don't think it's healthy for you to stay there - and for what it's worth, if this guy really is Anakin Skywalker, it isn't safe."

"Thank you" she repeats, and the transmission ends. She feels weak, foolish, and wonders idly if she shouldn't just leave for Coruscant tonight. But some tendril of the Force convinces her to stay - to swallow her misgivings and disbelief.

This time, when Rey sleeps, she dreams of waking in Ben's arms on Exegol. Her face is hot and her eyes sting when she finally wakes, but it's only the sand she tells herself.

* * *

**  
**

  


Sunsup finds her practicing with her quarterstaff in the early morning, sweat dripping between her shoulder blades, Master Leia's voice ringing in her mind.

_Let go. In, out, in, out. You are they, and they are you._

But she isn't they, and they aren't her. Rey is conceivably the last Jedi, or at least something like it, alive in the galaxy. Certainly there are other Sensitive beings, and among those are individuals who could be persuaded to be the Light and those who personify the dark. That balance had to exist, Master Leia had told her once, in order for peace to reign and chaos to reign in their turn. The sacrifice Darth Vader had made had been in vain - Palpatine had found a way to cheat death, and as such had used Ben as a tool for his entire life, coercing and seducing him to be at his side and succeed where Vader had failed.

Rey stops abruptly mid-parry at this thought:

Darth Vader had failed.

Redemption had been Ben's sole motivator since killing his father. Redemption, rather than conquering the galaxy, could be Anakin's motivation now.

She carries her staff back down to the living quarters, changing into attire more suited to manual labor. The vaporator and the water it would provide were the keys to her ability to upgrading her hyperdrive so that she could get the _Falcon_ running smoothly again - she'd taken a beating during the battle above Exegol and had almost been destroyed, though it was currently docked at pad 94 in Mos Eisley being attended to by mechanics in whom Rey didn't have much confidence. It was a famous ship, and she'd been through hell multiple times over. But the sooner she'd be able to get the vaporator running, the sooner she could leave.

At least, that's what she told herself until she spied the-man-who-would-be-Anakin peeling off the anti-corrosion paste as soon as she had resurfaced from the sparse living quarters.

"I told you, I don't need help."

His dark eyes flit to her briefly before settling once more on the task at hand. "You'll need a droid who is able to interface with the computer in this vaporator. Bocce is a binary language used to re-calibrate and reset the systems within. I wouldn't recommend buying a droid from the Jawas, though. Never know what you might get." His eyes seemed to twinkle, and Rey tried to hide her annoyance.

Rey failed.

"I think - I think you need to finish what you're doing, and I'll go get a droid who can speak Bocce. And I don't think that you should come back."

He finishes, taking the sheets of dried paste and tossing them into a waste receptacle he must have brought with him. "This unit's old - there's probably better out there, but it'll set you back more credits than the new technology is worth. I saw that you bought a new cooling and purification element - looks like that's all you'll need to be up and running again."

"Did you hear me? I said I don't want you coming back."

"My step-father ran this farm. Married my mother, delivered her from slavery - Cliegg Lars did what I never could. He took care of his family, and he saved my mother. Gods know why this place has survived as long as it has. But now you're here to revive it, and it's better that it be you than me, anyway. I was always tilting at windmills when I should have been focused on my mother - on what mattered."

"Of all the -" Rey rips the tool he's carrying from his hands, throwing it forcefully on the ground. With the aid of the Force, it bounces off the sand and launches several tens of meters to the east and out of sight.

"Why are you here? Surely you know what happened to your beloved master, Palpatine. Any half-witted Sith would know to stay away. You lost."

"I am not Sith" Anakin sighs, softly. She almost hadn't heard him.

"That's - that's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard, and just lately I've heard quite a few ridiculous things. I know you. I know your family. I knew your grandson, Ben, named for the old master you cut down in anger and hatred. I knew Master Luke, who all but exiled himself because he regretted his inability to thwart the darkness in Ben. The darkness he inherited from _you_ , so don't tell me you're not Sith. How did you come to revive yourself, anyway? Was it alchemy or cloning, like Palpatine?"

"The Force sees need where men do not. The Mystery isn't for us to know entirely. In answer to your question, I am not sure how I came to be here, in this time and in this body - but it was not my doing, nor the work of my former master Darth Sidious. I've only been back for six years now. Long enough to have seen your rise and heard of your fight against the First Order. Just as my son, I could have helped; but I stayed away. My return would have only caused more conflict." There is sadness in his voice, and Rey senses sincerity.

But Rey is also by now completely incredulous. "Master Luke helped us, in the end. You could have gone to Ben."

"Not while Darth Sidious had him in his grip. He would have used Ben to lure me back into his service as his right hand; I wouldn't have been able to withstand the guilt in losing him, too. I wasn't strong enough."

The suns have risen enough to make standing in the middle of the farm without cover rather uncomfortable. Rey is dripping with sweat; the increasing heat doesn't seem to effect Anakin, but against her own better judgment, Rey snaps out of her anger.

"Do you want some water?"

He nods. Again, they retreat to the lower levels of the farm to the living quarters. Again, she pours two large glasses of sweetwater. This time, they sip it timidly. Rey is the first to speak.

"You said that you knew Darth Sidious was controlling Ben's visions. How did you know?"

Anakin takes a well-timed gulp, rivulets of water escaping the mouth of the cup and sliding down the strong lines of his neck. "I found Palpatine's holocron. It was the first thing I did when I was reincorporated from the Living Force into a physical body. There are two Sith worlds: Exegol, whose location as you now know is protected to a degree by Sith magics, and Korriban. I went to the latter; for whatever reason, he had left his holocron there. Either that, or it had been placed there for me to find by him. I believe he wanted to draw me out, continuing to haunt Ben as a way to force my hand - anyway, the holocron contained not only his accumulated knowledge of the dark side, but his plans for raising his own Sith fleet and becoming Emperor once again. _Princeps aeterna_ ; the Eternal Emperor." Rey recognizes the language as Ancient Basic, and it sounds authentic enough. The entire story is plausible and Anakin tells it without even so much of a whiff of deceit from the Force, but Rey has been haunted by ghosts with regrets before. It rarely ends well. Solo had regretted his entire life almost, and only found peace on the other end of Kylo Ren's lightsaber.

He drains his cup and continues while Rey wordlessly pours a second cup. "I did know that Snoke was not a real being, as his existence was foretold in the holocron. I attempted to speak through my old helm to warn Ben, but he was not open to my words of caution. He had been seduced by the dark side, and I was in a weakened state - my connection to the Force wasn't strong enough to overcome Palpatine's ministrations."

"So you did nothing."

"I did not say that. We won't get anywhere until you give me the benefit of the doubt."

"This doubt of mine is vast, and you have another thing coming if you think that anyone in the Resistance will sit and listen to this as long as I have, so I will ask this only once: What do you want?"

There is no hesitation. "A second chance."

Rey's mouth gapes.

"You orchestrated the deaths of billions of innocent lives; you nearly killed your own wife, and you killed your Jedi Master. What is there to say that you won't be seduced by the dark again? Isn't that in your nature - in your very being?"

"I accepted the darkness because I thought it could save my wife."

"And because you thought that the Jedi Order was flawed."

"I will not deny that I still believe that to be the case."

"Ben is dead."

"I know."

"So are Luke and Leia."

Anakin freezes, a strange emotion playing across his features. "I know" he croaks, grasping the glass tightly and drinking deeply of it before it shatters.

"You really are Anakin Skywalker" Rey says, wondrous belief seizing her throat. "As such, you are under arrest as a political prisoner."

"I understand."

"We will return to Coruscant in five standard days. The first task of your sentence" she stabs one trembling finger at him "is to fix that vaporator so we can get off this rock. Perhaps if you prove that you aren't going to choke and maim all of us, the Resistance may spare your life. Your existence is highly classified as of this moment - do you understand?"

Anakin appraises her. Their eye contact seems to render her nude before him - for all her soldier's bravado, he has a way of making her feel small. It isn't out of a need for him to dominate the conversation or make her feel inferior; she senses that he truly does want to be helpful, although neither of them can anticipate what that might look like in this moment. Everything is unknown, even the solvency of what he had just shared; but Rey senses that this moment is important, will be important for not just Anakin or the Resistance, but for the galaxy as a whole.

"Did you love my grandson?" He asks randomly. "You look it. Your eyes - it is as if a part of you is missing. Will you tell me about him?"


	3. Desert Soliloquy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey feels the fullness of her grief for Ben in telling his grandfather about him. A curious closeness grows between them as they continue to work on getting the vaporator functional before the Mocking of the Suns, and their imminent departure from Tatooine.
> 
> Anakin tells Rey who her parents were, finishing the part of the conversation Ben had begun. 
> 
> Rey wants to trust Anakin, but resorts to covert behavior to ensure that she can.

Rey obliges.

When she tells Anakin that Han Solo had sired Ben, he clearly didn't approve. A sternly-set jaw and a wordless chuff sent Rey into a fit of laughter.

And for the first time, Rey thinks that _this_ version of Anakin Skywalker isn't so awful.

"Well, I mean, he was a smuggler but he was a smuggler with _conscience_. He did truly love Leia, if it's any consolation."

"He was troublesome even back then. Leia deserved better."

A third cup of water is poured. "Their marriage ended over what to do with Ben. He was so strong in the Force that Leia had balked at the idea of training him herself; Solo didn't want him trained at all. When Ben became Kylo Ren, their bond couldn't withstand the trauma of his fall."

"I was once as tempestuous. You were to Ben as Padme was to me; a counterbalance. But my indiscretions took on too much weight for her to bear alone. Ben knowingly disregarded his feelings for you. Just as Leia and Padme, _you_ deserved better."

This stops Rey's train of thought so abruptly she wonders if she's heard him correctly. In truth, Rey had not regretted kissing Ben on Exegol and likely would have done so sooner. Perhaps if she had only tried harder during their onslaught against Snoke on the _Devastator_ , she could have turned him and he'd be alive now. Tears sting her eyes, the combination of grit and hot regret making her shoulders sag and shake before she can think better of it.

"He knew what he had to do. He knew that undoing it would kill him. It wasn't Palpatine tossing him like a doll down into a crack in the earth - and I wanted so badly to believe that he was only wounded, that him giving the last of his Force signature somehow meant that he would stay with me. I want to blame someone, but in the end, I can't because the blame rests with him - with someone I love. He stole himself away from me because of the anger and fear he held inside. I can't reconcile that his goodness is what killed him."

"In a kinder galaxy, Luke would have taken more responsibility for Ben. He would have confronted him in love - not fear. If there is blame to be assigned, let it fall on my son's shoulders. Let it fall on mine for creating this legacy."

Rey sniffs, pulling the last drops of sweetwater from her cup. She rises and begins to make caf. Suddenly the headache behind her eyes that used to signal Ben's push into her consciousness had become too much; the caffeine would settle it. Anakin's hand shoots out and grasps her forearm, completely eclipsing her wrist. She looks at him like a caged animal, feral and hurting, but he locks eyes with her and they hold fast for several beats of silence.

"He does live within you. I believe he wanted you to carry on more than he would ever be able to find peace after killing Han Solo. He would be displeased to know that you feel you could have done more for him. Believe me in that I can say confidently that you did everything for my grandson; and for what it is worth, I am certain that he loved you."

Rey is well and truly speechless. She turns from him and boils the water for the caf, her face contorting in grief, and she lets the tears fall. She was tormented and haunted by Ben, but Anakin's assessment of Ben's feelings for her and what he did as Kylo Ren had never been spoken aloud but were things she had felt for some time. His absolution of her complicated regret in not doing more for Ben was equal parts unnerving and wondrous.

The caf is done quickly, and Anakin shakes his shaggy head when Rey offers him a ceramic mug with fresh Bantha milk swirled in. "I lived on the stuff during the Clone Wars. I can't stomach the taste anymore."

It isn't the first time Rey has shared a cup of caf with a legend. Leia had regaled every Alliance campaign leading up to the destruction of both Death Stars over so many cups of caf it's a wonder Rey can still drink it. She supposes the novelty hasn't worn off; she never could have dreamed of drinking it on Jakku. Solo's introduction of Corellian bloodwhisky had seen Rey drunk and subsequently hungover for three day, and of course he'd retold his own version of heroics in the era of the Galactic Empire. Leia had rolled her eyes, but let him tell the stories in his turn. Rey had always found that charming, that even with their distance and disagreements, there had always been deep love and respect between them.

"So" Anakin continues, slamming his hands down on the table to break the reverie. "The vaporator will be fixed by tomorrow, which is fortuitous because the Mocking of the Suns festival begins and you'll be able to sell your first yield. The water might be bitter for this first batch, but only because it's been so long since this was a working farm. The irrigation systems have been flushed, but those old pipes may deposit some, erm, funky minerals. Regardless, people will buy it because it's from the Lars farm - they'll want to say they bought the first round in over three decades."

"I'm sorry - 'Mocking of the Suns'?"

"It's a festival during which all of the resident moisture farmers get together on the hottest day of the year, and people come to barter for their yields. It's in the middle of the desert when the suns are highest in the sky; the idea is that we're mocking the heat and showing off our ability to harness the powers of nature in an unforgiving climate to thrive in spite of it. I believe it originated from some local pagan holiday."

Rey finishes off the caf and realizes that the headache has dulled to an intermittent throb. "Then we shouldn't waste any time. I would also remind you that you're still a prisoner. We'll deal with particulars and details after the festival."

"Very well" Anakin nods soberly. "Shall we?"

  
****

* * *

**  
**

As it turned out, the cooling and purification element was not easy to replace. Due to the age of the vaporator and the amount of time that had passed since its use, the internal components took forever to scrub of excess carbon just so that Rey could disconnect the previous c/p element to remove it. Anakin's hands were too large to work on the internal portion of the machine, so he hovered over and instructed her.

It took hours, between the scrubbing and the actual internal work. The twin suns were chasing each other across the bright white plain like children playing tag, the heat relentless, the resulting perspiration and exhaustion making them both begin to snap at each other.

"If you'd just use the calk as I taught you, the element should hold in place. It's lopsided."

" _You_ do it, then! You know more about this than I do! Maybe it's your instruction that's insufficient!"

"Perhaps I wasn't clear enough when I said 'Rey, please don't use too much calk or the element won't be positioned properly'. It's like reciting poetry to a Bantha."

"Fuck off."

They were sniping at each other, but Rey sensed a twinge of non-malicious amusement from Anakin straightaway. When she did, she laughed.

And he laughed.

Then he helped her guide the element into a more suitable position, his huge hands covering hers as they both held it in place until the calk dried enough. His breath caught in the shell of her ear as their laughter died down. Rey closed her eyes and for no discernible reason tried to recenter herself in the Force; she hadn't realized that she had let her own mental shielding slip, as had Anakin.

"Rey" he breathes. "Do you know why I'm here?"

She opens her eyes. "I couldn't say. I don't know. Why did Ben and Luke and Leia have to die? Why does nothing make sense without any of them here? Why am I alone on a sand-planet when I should be helping my friends rebuild the galaxy?"

"Perhaps there is something edifying in this work for both of us. Something the Force has willed."

"I - I can't think about it too much. Any of it. Palpatine is - he was my grandfather. I know nothing about my parents. I took your name because I thought Leia would want me to bear it as a memorial to your children and your grandson. Now it seems that maybe there's a specific place for me that I must accept."

"There was a familiarity in your Force signature. It is heavily reminiscent of Darth Sidious, though in his more congenial guise as Chancellor of the Republic. We used to talk for hours; he was supportive and caring. Or so I had thought."

"I don't want his name. There is so much suffering and evil behind it."

"Perhaps it is both our mandates to reclaim and redefine our names. Perhaps I am here to make amends; to help you discover the same peace Ben had, and to find it for myself." Anakin's organic hand slips down to accidentally graze her arm. "I believe the calk is dry."

Before Rey can respond, he's off stalking toward the steps leading down into the personal quarters. "I need something to eat" he tosses over his shoulder. "Try to see if you can make the 'fresher work. We've been sweating buckets for hours."

Rey nods, not that he can see her with his back turned, but she's shocked by how quickly he made an exit after what seemed to be a moment of repose forced by their work - and the touch of her arm was purely accidental. No. Darth fucking Vader had not just consoled her over losing his grandson and her; what? Force-boyfriend?

And then his hand slipped because he's not used to life outside of a life support suit and that's the only reason he touched her and it has nothing to do with them sharing a highly similar experience. Nothing at all. And it isn't weird.

"Poe?" Rey walks a couple of clicks away from the farm. His comm hadn't come as he'd promised that morning, and now she had even more to tell him.

"Uh, hey Rey. Wha - oh, gods, I forgot. The vote passed, Finn and I have been in no less than ten meetings today, and Mon Mothma is now the Chancellor of the New Republic. The base on Chandrila is ours. Rey? Are you there?"

She shook her head. "Yeah, it's fine. I'm fine. I just miss you guys."

"We miss you too. I'm so sorry that we've not been in touch as we ought. When Finn comes to collect you, he'll brief you before we go to Naboo."

Rey is struck speechless for the second time in one day.

"I'm sorry?"

"Naboo."

"Why?"

"Finn will brief you in a few days. I gotta go."

_Click._

Rey storms off in the direction of the steps down to the safety of her quarters, but remembers that Anakin and his bizarre half-guilt for their inconsequential and ultimately harmless touch is down there and probably sulking in a way that only a Skywalker male could.

She then recalls that the balance she owes on the _Falcon_ is small enough that she could probably steal the ship as-is, which is a prospect at which her more rule-abiding side bristles, and skip the waiting and the sun festival so that she could get to Coruscant sooner to rendezvous with the fleet and pull out Poe Dameron's unshaven stubble one grainy hair at a time because he's obviously hiding something.

She'd tasted his duplicity across the stars that separated them. It settled in the back of her throat like a kind of thick, viscous venom; but he hadn't omitted the truth to be malicious. He clearly knew something that Rey couldn't intuit but knew she'd be able to sort out for herself soon.

"Hey" Rey jabs, finding Anakin in the kitchen area sipping water and looking for all the world like a beaten stray. "We need to leave. Now."

"The vaporator's first batch will be finished by sunsdown tonight. Why the rush?"

"It's more of a feeling."

"The Force, as I have said, is strong around your path. And mine, but we must take the yield to the festival. We can't take the easy way out anymore."

"Fuck" Rey mutters. He's right, of course. And of course he looks pitiful and put upon, like Rey's pressuring and, frankly, rude methodology in relating to him had reached a head against her own psyche.

"He's - General Dameron - is hiding something from me. Something I feel is important, that he doesn't want me to know until General Finn arrives to escort us back to Coruscant."

"Search your feelings."

She doesn't want to believe what came flying uninvited as a conscious thought while she was speaking with Poe up on the dunes, but now she knows - looking at Anakin, there is no other explanation.

"He knows you're alive and here. And he's known that longer than I have."

Anakin shrugs. "Would it be the worst thing in the world?"

"Yes. It would, because instead of going to Coruscant to deposit you before the Senate, he's rerouting us to Naboo."

Anakin's face darkens. "That place will only haunt us both."

Rey sits after pouring another mug of caf. "He said that General Finn will brief us, but I sense that this has something to do with me more than it does you."

"Palpatine's home planet was Naboo. It was the only thing which I knew with any certainty that he legitimately loved. You may be called upon to answer for his crimes as proxy; the Naboo take such things seriously. Also, there's the question of the identity of your parents."

"What do you know about my father?"

Anakin clearly doesn't want to discuss this, but Rey is desperate. Whatever Finn and Poe have planned, she wants as much background information as she can reasonably gather from Anakin's bruised mind. He owes her that peace; he owes the galaxy that peace.

"Roldan Palpatine was the only good thing that ever came from anything the Emperor did. He impregnated a woman named Ysanne Isard one year before the formation of the Galactic Empire. Roldan was meant to be the hidden heir, trained and brought up to serve his father as the heir presumptive, but he met your mother - Mara Jade - and resisted the darkness of his sire. When you were conceived, I assume you were hidden on Jakku to buy time so Palpatine wouldn't find you. The same was done with my children."

Dark legacies, indeed. And she'd heard of Mara Jade; something about being the Emperor's Hand, a silent assassin trained in the dark side of the Force whose sole purpose was executing orders and hits directly from the Emperor. "How did my mother come to abandon Palpatine?"

Anakin leans forward, wiping his brow with a rag and taking a swig of her caf. "I think Roldan was in contact with the Alliance to try to hide you at the time, if memory serves. Mara watched the Emperor ruthlessly search the galaxy with the intent of killing his son when he was found, and that turned her. She had been his consort at one time as well, but Roldan loved her. When you were born, I - I kept Roldan's confidence and arranged the transport to take you to Jakku."

"You saved my life."

"Palpatine kept my children hidden from me for years. It was no more than he deserved. And" he raises a finger, sensing the conception of Rey's disgust "I wanted to ensure that no child born of dark blood would suffer the same fate as my children. Your life on Jakku was not easy, but it would have been devastating if Roldan and Mara had failed."

"So you did this. All of it."

"From a certain point of view."

Rey drains the caf, now only lukewarm. Her headache has evaporated, replaced by bone-deep exhaustion. They had been out all morning and most of the afternoon, at the mercy of the suns' relentless, driving heat. She steadies her breathing and finds her center as Leia taught her; too many days of manual labor and too few hours spent in congress with the Force had depleted her reserves of patience and benevolence, but she at least owed Anakin her thanks. Again.

"I think then that you didn't fail when you saved Luke from the Emperor. If I had been killed, perhaps he would have succeeded in revitalizing the Final Order. I can't fault you for the choices you made when it came to me. In fact, I owe you a debt of gratitude."

"You would have done the same."

That night, instead of going back to - wherever he had previously gone to sleep, Rey invites him to stay. He does. He sleeps on a pallet and she sleeps on her bedroll in her quarters, and that's that. It's only because the festival is tomorrow and it doesn't make sense to kick him out, she reasons with herself, and because now she kind of owes him. And that sense of Jakku indebtedness can be quieted by the hospitality shown her by the rest of the galaxy, but it can't be quieted entirely.

It's only because he's helped me, she thinks. It has nothing to do with the way his hand felt reassuring and warm against mine. Nothing at all.

Rey dreams of all the things she wishes she could say to Ben, but no words actually form in her mind. When she wakes the following morning, Ben is not the first being about whom she thinks.

Instead, her first thought is that she needs to take a quick blood sample from Anakin Skywalker, which she does just barely without waking him, and transmits it with all due haste to General Poe Dameron, Head Asshole of the Resistance.


	4. The Exegol Conundrum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> General Poe Dameron, with the assistance of Dr. Harter Kalonia, analyzes the DNA sample from Anakin Skywalker.

"So you knew." Dr. Harter Kalonia, a decorated war veteran and a staunch believer in no-nonsense communication, appraises Poe with a raised eyebrow. The general, for all his newfound hubris as one half of the dyad leaders of the Resistance, blanches in the face of her frankness. Poe had come to her unannounced, dropped the sample on her desk, and was behaving like a caged animal. Kalonia had never particularly appreciated Dameron's candor during their tandem service in the Resistance, but these days she found herself almost feeling sorry for him. Thrust into a leadership role without any of Leia's expertise and certainly none of her finesse and political savvy, the pilot oddly deferred to Harter on more than one occasion. She would be annoyed but for deciding that assisting Poe was her final act of devotion to Leia's leadership - and friendship - over the years.

"I didn't think it would be constructive to tell her about Exegol and what we found there. I don't think she made it far enough to see what Palpatine had been up to."

"And he likely didn't explain himself. In any event, and don't ask me how, but I compared the DNA sample Rey sent against an old Republic sample. It's over forty years old, taken by Jedi Master Qui Gon Jinn when Anakin Skywalker was around ten Standard years old."

Poe exhales explosively. "I do have to ask you how you found that."

Kalonia rolls her eyes and swipes her hand over the control panel of a holotable. Unused to the newer technologies of Coruscant next to the frustratingly-dated equipment she'd made do with during her time racing around the galaxy with the Resistance, she finds a simple joy in being able to manipulate an instrument and receive an immediate response. The two DNA samples hum to life, side by side, before the general and the doctor.

"The sample on the left is the one Master Jinn took. We discovered it on Exegol during the excavation of Palpatine's stronghold. It is, as far as we are aware, the only piece of information specific to former Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker that existed after the creation of the Galactic Empire."

Poe shifts his weight. "I heard about the journals" he says softly, his lilting baritone betraying no small amount of discomfort.

Ostensibly, their expedition to Exegol was for the sole purpose of banishing the magics which had ensured it never showed up on any star chart prior to the definitive battle above it. Off record, he had given Dr. Kalonia full medical and scientific reign when it came to extracting Palpatine's rudimentary cloning technology on the Sith planet - but they had also uncovered and translated several volumes - personal diaries written in Sith glyphs - that Palpatine had kept, beginning shortly after the second Death Star's destruction up until his demise at Rey's hand. In those volumes, he extrapolated on an unnatural and twisted relationship with Anakin Skywalker - and a desire to, if he could not turn Ben Solo, resurrect Anakin to essentially recreate the dyad they had forged at the conclusion of the Clone Wars, when the former Jedi became Sith. The diaries themselves were protected by ancient Sith magics, and those science officers who uncovered them were at the least no longer on active duty, and irreparably mentally scarred at worst.

"Well, in addition to those journals, he had kept a sort of collection of all things Anakin Skywalker. Palpatine was obsessed with him; and at first, I had considered that perhaps he had been successful in cloning Skywalker. But -" her voice trails off. Poe leans over the holotable.

"But?"

"In cloning, even processes as unrefined and corrupted as Palpatine used to create Supreme Leader Snoke, there will be certain small, insignificant genetic mutations. Eye and hair color, mostly, but in Force-sensitive individuals, the midichlorian count will decrease. Not drastically, but enough to be conclusive that cloning was responsible for _this_ version of Anakin Skywalker. As you can see" Kalonia enlarges the two DNA strands "there are no such variations. The midichlorian counts are identical between the two. The only medical conclusions I can draw are that he has aged naturally in the time since both samples were taken."

Poe takes a deep breath, holds it, lets his shoulders sag. "What are you saying?"

"I do love a man who gets to the point" Kalonia says dryly. "I am saying that this man is Anakin Skywalker. He is not a clone, and he has not been forged from whatever Sith magics Palpatine employed to create Snoke. I would see clear anomalies if that were the case, but it appears that Palpatine was never successful in his attempts to clone Anakin Skywalker."

"That is alarmingly unhelpful."

"Look, I don't make the rules. I'm presented with data, and I analyze it according to the sum of all its parts. This is still conclusive; of what, however, I am ultimately uncertain. I can only reach medical conclusions; I can't fill in blanks which beg for expertise outside of my purview."

"No, I get that - I had just told Rey that Finn would brief her, and I was reasonably certain that Anakin had been cloned. That's what I was planning on telling her."

The fatigued physician switches off the holotable and motions for Poe to sit. He does, slumping over and looking at the medical officer with a kind of smoldering defeat which thaws even Kalonia's battle-hardened heart. She does feel badly for the general; he inherited a mess, both politically and otherwise, and even with Chancellor Mothma rebuilding the Senate and taking the helm, they had miles to go before the galaxy would see true peace. The mysterious reappearance of Anakin Skywalker only compressed them further.

"You can't wing it, Poe. You're not in a cockpit making split-second decisions anymore; you're a leader. Would Leia have just jumped to the conclusions you did? How long have you known that Anakin Skywalker was alive?"

Poe rubs his eyes with balled fists. "For the last year. I found out after Crait; I - I found some communiques between Luke and Leia. Apparently, Anakin had gone to Ahch-To to confront Luke about what had happened with Ben Solo. Luke had warned Leia, and - hells, I was never supposed to know any of this. When I asked Leia about it, she gave me some half-assed answer about how Vader's sacrifice was in vain because the Emperor was able to cheat death, and that the Force had 'recycled' Anakin Skywalker so that he could set things right."

Kalonia sighs. "Leia played her cards close to the vest when it came to her understanding of the Force, but she wouldn't say anything she didn't think was ultimate truth."

"I need to create some kind of narrative for why Anakin Skywalker is alive, even if it's untrue. I can't go to Rey with no information beyond 'he's not a clone'."

"That is - wildly unethical, even for you."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, doc." Poe rises, looking out over Coruscant's bustling air traffic. Behind him, Kalonia rustles, her own unsettled ruminations tangible even to someone who wasn't Sensitive.

"Poe, I can't dig any deeper. I could run neurological examinations until I turn blue in the face, I could run extensive pulmonary and respiratory testing to prove that he was never immolated on Mustafar if it would please you - but none of that would lead to anything truly conclusive. And Rey deserves the truth."

He knows Kalonia is right; and he knows that there is only one being in the galaxy capable of helping them unravel the growing question of Skywalker's origins.

"Maz" he says evenly, without turning to face the physician. "Maz Kanata. Ever heard of her?"

"Quirky old bartendrix at a dusty fort blown apart by the First Order. I tended the wounded from that battle and laid more than one to rest. Why?"

"She had his lightsaber. Rey found it. I'm wondering -"

" - if Maz knows far more than any of us?" she finishes softly. "I'd say you should start there."

Poe turns, nods at the doctor, and leaves. Kalonia sits in the growing twilight, watching all of Coruscant hustle through the large transparisteel window in her office, wondering how anyone could simply continue on in a daze, unaware of the horrors of the galaxy. And she languishes in guilt, and she tastes resentment on the tip of her tongue for the first time since delivering Ben Solo thirty years ago.


End file.
